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foodzings: May 2008

Saturday, May 31, 2008

Pepperoncini Birthday Lunch

It was Big Kev's birthday on Friday, so we took him out to Pepperoncini. He had seen my earlier post about this place, and was so swayed by my stupendous food blogging, that he personally selected it for his birthday lunch. That's the power of this blog, people! :-)
R got a pasta dish. What was he thinking? He knew about the sandwiches, but he got pasta anyway. For shame! This was the Linguini Mastriciana, which came with pancetta, shallots, diced tomato, and extra virgin olive oil in a white wine sauce. While I'm sure it was good (he said it was), when it comes to lunch here, it's all about the sandwiches! R got the chicken cutlet sandwich, which came with roasted red peppers, sweet garlic-herb mayo, and hunks of fontina cheese. And yeah, it's on those conshohocken bakery rolls that are to die for!
The birthday boy got the roasted pork sandwich. The waitress had recommended it as one of the best items on the menu on our first visit. Big Kev loved this. This was the biggest sandwich of them all.
D got the chooch burger. It's a burger, and it's huge, and it too, comes on that awesome conshohocken bakery roll. I like how they hollowed out the top it so you can fit it on top of all the stuff.

I got the sandwich special, which was a sausage parm. Yes, it was good! As opposed to last time when the sandwiches came with boring chips, this time we got homemade potato chips, or what seemed to be homemade chips. These were superb. I even ate the ones off D's plate cuz he wasn't eating them. No point in wasting them!

Service was good, as usual. We got there pretty early and we were the only people there. But pretty soon, the place filled up. For such an unassuming hidden place, lots of the locals that work here seem to know about it. I truly think this is one of the best places to eat in Conshy.

Pepperoncini Restaurant & Bar
72 Poplar St
Conshohocken, PA 19428
610-941-7783

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Il Cantuccio

Il Cantuccio is a teensy little BYOB in Northern Liberties on 3rd. I'd passed by it dozens of times before but had never really wanted to go in (sounds like Pepperocini, eh?). I met some friends I hadn't seen in a long time there last week. Like I said, it's teeny tiny, so you definitely need reservations. That's the menu - one simple laminated sheet. You get complimentary bread. Loved the bread. It comes with two spreads, one was roasted red pepper and the other, a green mystery. We forgot to ask so I don't know what it was made of, but they were both awesome.
F got a house salad. This was the small, but it was still pretty big. All three of us shared it.
Z got the Sampdoriana, which was fusilli with shrimp and broccoli in a garlic sundried tomato sauce. This had a slightly strange taste. I attribute this to the sundried tomatoes, as I don't like sundried tomatoes. Z said it had a slight "asian" taste to it. I could see where he was coming from.
Both F and I got the fettucine pasta special. It came with shrimp and crab meat in a pink sauce. Totally great. I cleaned my darn plate. The service here was ok, nothing spectacular. There was one waitress waiting on the entire place. But that's ok here, like I said, it's very tiny, maybe 20 seats in the entire place? It's a nice little BYOB option in NoLibs.

Il Cantuccio
701 N 3rd St
Philadelphia, PA
215-627-6573

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Monday, May 26, 2008

Beau Monde!

The sis-in-law was insisting on getting crepes. We had gone to the other place last year, so we went to Beau Monde this time. Whoo hoo! Finally! I've been wanting to go here for a long ass time. The place is adorable on the inside. Very frenchy. There is also some outside seating. We got there fairly early and almost scored an outside seat, but got screwed out by people who had been waiting for it.

Mom got the scrambled eggs with blueberries and maple syrup in a sweet crepe. How was this? Um... good!

My bro was the only one who got a savory crepe. He got the andouille sausage, ratatouille and caramelized tomato sauce crepe. Oh yeah, this was good too. But in a completely non-sweet crepe way.

Sis-in-law got the pears, chocolate, and creme anglaise crepe. This was good too, but I wasn't too crazy about it. It's not for me.
I got the banana, white chocolate, caramel, and vanilla ice cream crepe. Oh baby. This was better than I thought it would be. And people, these crepes are big. You will be stuffed. I can see why everybody raves about this place. The crepes are stupendous. The place is adorable, the service is pretty good, the food comes out quick, and it has a good vibe. I like that there's so much variety that you could come here and get something different each time. That's my plan.

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Sunday, May 25, 2008

Holy Humongo Pizza

The other night, we were hanging out in Northern Liberties. R hadn't eaten dinner before leaving, so we stopped by a random pizza spot so she could get a slice. 2nd Street Pizza was the lucky winner. And they were home of the biggest pizza slice I'd ever seen in my life (sorry for the sucky cellphone photo). My hand on left, giant pizza slice that had to be sliced in half to be eaten on the right.

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Brand New Korean

You know that what my family and I do best is eat. And eat we did. After looking at that really old stuff, we eventually got hungry again. A new Korean restaurant opened up in Upper Darby, so we decided to check it out. It's called Sanchon. It's in a horrible building that looks like a diner and used to be a weird buffet place.

After we ordered (what ended up being way too much food), they gave us some complimentary appetizers. Some fried tofu and zucchini and a simple salad with ginger dressing. Word, this dressing, like the kind you get at japanese places, was so damn good. I could have just eaten a big vat of this stuff.Then the banchan came out, and even more complimentary food came out! Some salted and grilled mackeral. I love fish like this. It's so simple yet so good. We had to try the kalbi, so we got one order. It was only supposed to be for one person, but man, this was enough to eat for 3-4 people. Whoa. It was pretty good too.Sis-in-law wanted some korean fried chicken. They did not have that on the menu, so she got the ganpungki, which is a deep fried and then stir fried sweet and spicy chicken dish. Pretty good.
My bro wanted the mul naengmyun. Happy to say that this was also pretty good. Sometimes, you want a cold noodle soup. Or at least I do. Mom got the dolsot bibimbap. Good as well.

Me, I got the yukkaejang. It was also pretty good, not as spicy as I would have suspected it would be. It was also not temperature hot as I thought it should be. All in all, the food was good. There was nothing great about any of it, but it was all good. And for korean food, it was quite inexpensive. And man, was there lots of food. We had tons of leftovers!

Sanchon Korean Resturant

7260 Marshall Road

Upper Darby, PA 19082

610-626-1992

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Back on the Crack

Ah, it's warm again folks. Which means I'm back on the Capogiro crack. Blood orange and kiwi. F'in good and f'in good.

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Noodles Galore

With the fam in town for the holiday weekend, we took a jaunt into town Saturday so that we could go to the U Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Before looking at that really old stuff, we stopped by chinatown for a bite to eat. I took us to the Nan Zhou Hand Drawn Noodle House. It's a pretty tiny spot ,and yes, they do make the noodles here, by hand. I saw it myself.

There are some appetizers, but most of the menu is noodle soups. And they're all under $6. Score. My bro got the beef brisket noodle soup. Hunks of meat in a beef broth, with some greens thrown in. There was some random pickled cabbage in there too.

The sis-in-law got the egg and vegetable noodle soup. Good guess if you figured there would be egg and veggies in this! This came in a chicken broth. It was very light.

Mom got the seafood noodle soup. It had some shrimp, scallops, clam, and fish balls in it. Oh yeah, all the soups came with a whole bunch of cilantro thrown on top. Mom hates cilantro, with a passion. She can't stand it!!! We had to help her pick out every last bit. I don't know what's wrong with her. Cilantro rocks!

I got me the braised ox spare ribs noodle soup. Big name, big soup. You get tons of food in these economic buckets of soup. And these noodles? They really are delicious. Like no other noodles I've tasted before. Just say no to dried noodles!

Nan Zhou Hand Drawn Noodle House

927 Race St
Philadelphia, PA 19107

(215) 923-1550

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Saturday, May 24, 2008

There Will Be Cupcakes

More fun with macros! We had a small going away for one of our designers. It's quite the good excuse for cupcakes. Ok, so these were from Genuardi's, but these were damn good. Simple cupcakes with a giant squeeze of icing and sprinkles. It's good icing people! So maybe ordering 80 cupcakes for 15 people wasn't the best idea. And it ended up that half the office was empty because of it being the friday before memorial day and all. Oh well, I ended up taking tons of these puppies home!


By the Love of Grace

I went to a show later this week and stopped by Grace Tavern for a pre-show bite. I've been wanting to go here for awhile since I'd heard about the blackened green beans. I knew I was going to be getting these. D got the kelly burger, which came with bacon and cheddar. Also, a side of delicious fries with Monk's bourbon mayo. Once again, I let D be a guest blogger.

"That's good burger, very tasty. Those are good fries. They're spicy fries. If I didn't like spicy fries, I wouldn't have liked these spicy fries."

Yeah, he's right, they are spicy fries. And they're good spicy fries. Oh baby.


Our waiter looked straight out of 80's glam band Faster Pussycat. It was freakin uncanny, and his pants were so damn tight. I asked him for a recommendation and he recommended the jambalaya. So I went with it. Not bad. Certainly not great, but not bad. Shows you what happens when you trust the opinions of a glam metal guitarist. The garlic bread was pretty good too, but perhaps a bit too crunchy.


Onto the best part of the meal... Behold the blackened green beans! Fresh green beans smothered in magical blackened spice. They were certainly spicy, and certainly crunchy. I really enjoyed these. Your fingers get blackened too, and probably your teeth. It comes with the same Monk's bourbon mayo, and it's a nice thing to dip into. I got the small order, but it came with a decent amount of beans. Next time? I'll just get a big thing of beans and a big thing of fries.

Other than his overly tight pants, the service by Mr. Faster Pussycat was just fine. The place is really dark and pretty small. Most of it is bar, and there is a very tiny dining area with probably about 16 seats. It really filled up right after we got there. So good luck getting a table!

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Friday, May 23, 2008

Pepperoncini

I drive the same way to work every day, down Elm St. And every day, I pass by an unassuming restaurant called Pepperoncini. I've never ever thought of going into this place. Not once. But for a few weeks, people at work have been talking about it. R wanted to escape the office Thursday, so we decided to stop by. Are we ever glad we did!

The place is totally cute. And there's a nice little bar inside too. They have a simple lunch menu, with sandwiches, pasta, and pizza. R got the italian sausage sandwich with broccoli raab. Do you see how big this is? And the bread... the glorious bread! It's crusty and crispy and chewy with the perfect amount of sesame seeds. I'm in love with this bread. It's from the Conshohocken Bakery. I'm totally going there to pick up some of this awesome bread.

As for me, I got the hot roast beef sandwich. Totally good. So big that I couldn't finish it. We both totally love this place now, as much as we love this bread. The service was great, our waitress was super friendly and helpful. The place was filled with a nice professional lunch crowd. Yey for secret little spots in Conshy!

Pepperoncini Restaurant & Bar

72 Poplar St
Conshohocken, PA 19428
610-941-7783

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Thursday, May 22, 2008

Sonam Happy Hour

I attended another fantastic Yelp happy hour Wednesday night. It was held at Sonam, on South Street, and they closed down the whole place just for us. It's a really cute and small place. I loved the way it was decorated. It's a "global tapas" place that's also a byob.
I don't remember what these were, but they were on little crunchy pieces of mini toasts, and had egg salad, chicken salad, and something else. I liked em. Asian chicken slider. Ok, these I totally dug. I ate many many of these little suckers. Delicious. A was saying they tasted like his mom's turkey burgers, well damn, she makes some good ass turkey burgers.They call these S'mores, but they're not traditional s'mores. It was goat cheese with a fig reduction. Shudder. I'm not a fan of goat cheese. I didn't try these.
Shrimp. Don't remember what these were like, but I liked them.
Beef on a stick. These were kind of boring and plain. Meh. "South Philly Negamaki". Strange, but ok. Chicken Tikka Masala Parmesan. Loved these!At some point in the evening, edamame came out. And I love me some edamame.

This was some kind of dessert tapas. Something they cooked up for us. Ice cream, cinnamon and sugar, and crunchy stuff. Loved it.

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Monday, May 19, 2008

More Shakes!

After dinner, I got an impromptu invitation to Nifty Fifty's for shakes. Who can say no to shakes? Who can say no to Nifty Fifty's? Sure, I was stuffed, but who cares. Ok, R said shakes, but somehow she made us order cheese fries. No complaints really, but I so did not need to eat these.

R got peanut butter cup and I got strawberry cheesecake. Ok, my shake was pretty much strawberry, with really little cheesecake. It was still good, but really, they should just call it strawberry.